1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to monitors and, more particularly, to a novel medical equipment monitor apparatus and method whereby remotely located medical equipment is continuously monitored for selected performance characteristics.
2. The Prior Art
Advances in modern healthcare, particularly the rapid technological advances being experienced almost daily in the healthcare industry, represent significant benefits to patients through improved healthcare delivery to the patient. However, these advances are accompanied by increased costs to society. Not only do these remarkable technological advances contribute to the overall cost increases in healthcare services but they also extend the period over which these costs are incurred by extending the lifespan of persons who would have otherwise died. An important aspect of the foregoing is the recent trend to move patients out of the hospital setting into less costly environments such as skilled nursing facilities in certain instances although the preferred environment is that of the home setting.
Healthcare delivery in the home on an outpatient basis not only reduces the overhead and labor costs for facilities and skilled nursing care but also places the patient in familiar surroundings in the presence of others who are emotionally attached to the patient. It is a well-known phenomena that a patient in familiar surroundings and in the presence of loved ones experiences a remarkably increased feeling of well being and a more rapid recovery. Accordingly, there is an increasing interest in moving patients, whose conditions only a decade or so ago would have mandated hospitalization, out of the hospital setting into, preferably, the home setting.
This outplacement of patients means that certain items of fairly sophisticated life support equipment must accompany the patient to the home setting. One common item of life support equipment, for example, is an oxygen delivery system that can include a source of either compressed or liquid oxygen or derive its oxygen from an oxygen concentrator. Accompanying this piece of equipment is a pulse oximeter for measuring the oxygen concentration in the blood of the patient as well as an apnea monitor, in certain instances. The equipment is generally leased and maintained by a home healthcare agency that is responsible for its proper operation.
However, in the absence of a skilled professional such as found in the hospital setting, there is no apparatus or method for continuously monitoring this equipment on a twenty-four hour basis. The home healthcare agency does send a technician into the home on a regular basis of three or four times a week, but there is no accurate monitoring of this equipment on a consistent basis. Further, equipment failure may either go unrecognized by the patient and those around him or her or be of such a nature that the reporting person may erroneously report the wrong system malfunction. It is also a well-known problem that certain equipment undergoes a gradual deterioration in its performance during use so that the loss of support to the patient is especially insidious over time.
In view of the foregoing what is needed is a medical equipment monitor apparatus and method for directly and continuously monitoring the performance of selected items of medical equipment not only to provide an appropriate alarm signal but also to record all desired parameters of the operational characteristics of the equipment. It would also be a significant advancement in the art to provide the medical equipment monitor apparatus with the capability to transmit information and alarm conditions to a remote location. Such a novel apparatus and method is disclosed and claimed herein.